Commercially available cereal noodles contain non-wheat cereal, such as oat, buckwheat, barley, pearl barley, rice, brown rice. However, it is difficult to form a matrix or net-like structure when making dough from non-wheat cereal. Cereal noodles with large amounts of non-wheat cereal do not have the good mouthfeel and texture that is preferred by customers. As a result, the amount of non-wheat cereal in commercially available cereal noodles has to be controlled and may be present in only minor amounts.
The cereal noodles may be formed into instant noodles, and most of the commercially available instant noodles are fried instant noodles. In general, the fried instant noodles are formed by frying cooked noodles in 140-160° C. oil. By being instantly heated to a high temperature, the water content of the noodles is decreased, and holes are produced in the noodles. Therefore, the resulting fried instant noodles can be softened and edible after being soaked in boiling water for about 3 minutes. The fried instant noodles have the aroma of frying, and are loved by the public. However, fried instant noodles contain a large amount of saturated fatty acids, because the fried instant noodles have an oil content that is usually about 20%, thereby making the fried instant noodles high-calorie and potentially harmful to cardiovascular health.
Since the consciousness of people in health has improved, non-fried instant noodles that have advantages of being low fat and low-calorie are getting more and more attention. The non-fried instant noodle has more water content, but also has about a quarter of the oil content of the fried instant noodle. The water-recovery capacity of the non-fried noodle is generally poor in comparison to the fried instant noodle because more holes are produced in the fried noodle during oil frying than those are produced in the non-fried instant noodle, which is typically dried by hot air drying. Therefore, the time required by the fried instant noodle for soaking in boiling water is shorter than that of the non-fried instant noodle.
The soaking time of the non-fried instant noodle may be reduced by improving the drying process of the non-fried instant noodle. For instance, microwave drying can decrease the water content of the noodle to about 10%. Besides improving the drying process, a large amount of chemically modified starch may be added to the dough of the non-fried noodle to reduce the soaking time. Because of the water absorption property of the chemically modified starch, a noodle containing chemically modified starch can absorb water quickly and be softened after soaking in boiling water to make the non-fried instant noodle recover in shorter time in order to be edible. However, this method has two disadvantages:                1. The instant noodle has to be formed by using chemically modified starch, which is not natural; and        2. The chemically modified starch has to be added in a greater quantity to improve water-recovery capacity, which inevitably compresses the amount of the non-wheat cereal in the instant noodle, and thus the amount of the non-wheat cereal cannot be improved.Moreover, the compressed amount of the non-wheat cereal in the instant noodle due to the addition of the chemically modified starch makes the daily consumption of the cereal instant noodle increase to ingest enough amount of the non-wheat cereal, and thus the non-wheat cereal instant noodle loses the health-conscious features of the product. Until now, instant noodles having a large amount of non-wheat cereal have not been developed.        
Accordingly, there is a need for a flour composition and method for preparing an instant noodle, which can improve the amount of the non-wheat cereal in the instant noodle, wherein the noodle has a good water-recovery capacity.